Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict Origins to 1967


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   delete. The consensus here is that the article is inappropriate for inclusion. The discussion appears, however, to suggest that a need for sub-articles such as these exists. The consensus means that the article will be deleted, but the content can be userfied on request to me at my talkage. I would encourage all participants to discuss how the main article should be split before proceeding with such articles. Fritzpoll (talk) 10:25, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict Origins to 1967

 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

The author of this article was trying to deny the fact that Lebanon participated in the 1948 war and was trying to downplay the Jewish acceptance of the UN Partition Plan and the Arabs' violent reaction to it in 1947 in the original History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict article. It appears that since these efforts have been thwarted, she decided to write her own separate article as a kind of pov fork. Much of this article is already covered in the present History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict article, which is generally accepted and has been relatively calm for an article about such a controversial topic until just last week. GHcool (talk) 18:48, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete as POV fork. Artw (talk) 19:12, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Strong delete . This is a copy of the History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict article, edited by one person to suit his/her own views and avoiding any form of consensus. I don't have time to check exactly what edits were made, but this is not on, as it's trying to dupe readers into thinking this is an "official" account of the Isreali-Palestinian conflict. Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 19:19, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Are you under the impression that wiki pages are official history?..Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 22:50, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Move to the author's talk page (as pov fork) so that he can go on his work and once finished, let's discuss on the article's talk page to see which version would be the best. (nb: Lebanon participated passively to the '48 war in supporting ALA but the Lebanese army never violated the border but was attacked by Israeli and invaded by Syrians during several months. (see eg, Benny Morris, 1948: The First Arab-Israeli War, 2008, Yale University Press.) Ceedjee (talk) 21:25, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. The author's rationale for creating the article is sound, i.e., the original article covers too much material. Ian Pitchford (talk) 21:50, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * That might have been a good rationale for creating the article, but it is certainly not a good rationale for the vast number edits subsequently made that appeared to be geared at tailoring the article to meet one person's requirements instead of a proper consensus. If the article is too long, a split should be properly discussed on the History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict talk page, not unilaterally imposed by one person. Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 22:17, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. Rational; the subject is to large for one article, it's time for it to be split into sections. The is already Israel-Palestine conflict (which merely repeats History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict with no greater depth and there is a dearth of citations on both of those articles), split History of into component parts. The majority of web sites use the split method to encompass the subject. Yes there are 2 same articles already; however mine is not one of them, mine is beefing up the front and dropping the hindquarters enabling more depth to be covered and linking to pertinent areas, readers are able to navigate without having to search endlessly as you have to from the other 2 articles that are trying to achieve everything and achieving nothing. The alternative is go back to the old wiki where half of the protagonists have disappear to achieve the correct size....for WP:NPOV and WP:UNDUE each article in the existing format will have to double in size because at the moment they are Israeli centric...I'm just adding Palestinian nationalism into the articles...I know that is not popular but Palestinian exist and palestinian nationalism exists and so far it does not show up in either of the 2 other articles (well it does now as I've dropped the front end of mine into History of which is getting to be very large)...As I don't own the article and am not the only editor with access to the article I can hardly impose other than supply sentences with  references.....any tailoring of the article is to fit the references supplied...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 22:34, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Don't be duped by this so-called "rationale." The history of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict ought not to be broken up arbitrarily (pre- and post-1967). The article is already broken up into articles that go into greater detail (see, for example, Zionism, Hajj Mohammad Amin al-Husseini, British Mandate of Palestine, 1947 UN Partition plan, 1948 Arab-Israeli war, 1948 Palestinian exodus, etc etc).  Also, why is 1967 the demarcation line? Why not 1948? Why not 1993? Why not 2000? --GHcool (talk) 23:13, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * The correct procedure for dealing with articles that are too long is to reduce some or all of the sections to summaries, and to put the old text of the section(s) into fresh article(s). Copying a selection of the text into a new article without affecting the old one does not address the issue of the article being too long, and, in any case, imposing a change of this magnitude on an article edited by so many people is considered editing against consensus. (Okay, it doesn't actually "change" the original article, but two articles having the same text edited by different people to their preferences is just as bad.) Your justification of adding "Palestinian nationalism" to the article is pretty much an admission that you are creating a POV fork. (Supplying references to fit one POV and altering the text "to fit the references supplies" is still a POV fork.) If you think the original article is biased towards one side, you should discuss it on the talk page first. There are ways of escalating the dispute if you're not happy with that outcome. Creating your own article isn't one of them. Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 08:14, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm all for deleting History of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as the name is a POV title. I would prefer the name to be Origins of the conflict in Palestine as trying to make out that only Israelis and Palestinians were involved is patently false, having the British mandate there is a big clue for a start...the POV fork is having the original article name by just two of the protagonists...why wasn't it named History of the Ottoman, British, French, Russian, Israeli Palestinian conflict....obviously because someone had a POV in the first instance...to be inclusive and reflect NPOV the article I started should really be called History of the conflict in Palestine as the conflict had its roots in European involvement from Napoleon, British annexation of Egypt, European Zionism all before the Jewish Zionism got on the scene...It is a false premise to have an article called History of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as the conflict had started way before the start date of that article and History of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict article makes no mention of those pertinent facts...the article I have started will be including those parts that have been left out and not mentioned in even the minutest amount in History of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict....the two articles will overlap as major European involvement finished in 1948 with the end of the mandate...so I propose a name change to: History of the conflict in Palestine...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 18:55, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, if a name featuring the words "Israeli-Palestinian" is a POV title for not acknowledging the involvement of Britain, France etc., calling it "History of the conflict in Palestine" is surely an even worse POV title because it insinuates that there is no such country as Israel (which is one of the favourite mantras used by some of the more extreme anti-Israel/Zionism/Jew arguments). In any case, you would never ever delete a long-standing article just because you don't like the title - at the most you'd rename it, with consensus on the talk page first. Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 21:56, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * What makes you think that an article about Palestine prior to the advent of Zionism is the best place for details of Palestine?...or are you intimating the Zionism is a POV fork and should be deleted?
 * I do realise that the pro-Israeli version of history is to try to make Hajj Amin as the sole representative of the Palestinian people a false and POV view
 * Palestinian nationalism started before 1922
 * 1947 was the culmination of a Zionist endeavour to create a Jewish state as were the follow ups of 1948 and the Nakba...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 09:45, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Userfy until (if ever) the article is ready for mainspace. There is absolutely no logic to having this article, because: a) A logical split from History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict should be much smaller and with much less mutual information; b) A logical split from History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict should be made in logical time periods, not X BCE–1967. Not to mention, the article itself as it is written is a POVFORK. -- Ynhockey (Talk) 23:01, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * mainly because all Palestinian nationalism was absent from the original highly POV article, if size matters then there is always the loads of unreferenced Israeli POV to be removed...Before I started to edit the original POV article there was a Zionist section but no corresponding Palestinian nationalism section...now there is both, and I put references in the Zionist section....funny how the Palestinian project editors improve Israeli Project work, whereas Israeli project editor make spurious claims of NPOV by not even including the opposing point of view....Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 00:05, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete per Ynhockey. This is basically an alternative narrative to History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. It is a very nice article, and I would suggest moving it to Wikibooks, as an introduction to the conflict. -- Nudve (talk) 04:40, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * It is not an alternative it is an inclusive version...and as such the original is unable to be expanded to include all the missing pertinent area...the original is a narrow POV version ...I know that Israeli project wish to narrow the subject ...but that is at the expense of factual accuracy...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 09:29, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete or move to Userspace: Ashley may well be correct in his view that History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict is too long, or that it lacks sufficient detail. If so, he should bring that up on the article talk page and suggest that it be broken up into a series of articles; or he should edit that article to improve it. Going off and writing a second article covering exactly the same topics already covered is not the way we generally do things at Wikipedia. --Ravpapa (talk) 05:35, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * comments
 * Both current title article and broken choice are not wise. 1948 is the year at which the article should start because there can hardly have been an "Israeli-xxx" conflit before May 14, 1948. Historians (such as Benny Morris in Victims) talk about the Zionist-Arab conflict for the period before 1948.
 * Consensus among historians for the birth of the Palestinian nationalism is fixed around 1920, not 1967. Some Palestinian historians fix this at the end of the XIXth anyway. The 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine is considered by [Palestinian] historians as the [Arab] Palestinian independence war (independence war, ie nationalism main point). The only issue is that they lost it and could not get rid of the British.
 * Ceedjee (talk) 06:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Palestinian nationalism began earlier than 1920. Many Palestinian national organisations existed earlier than 1920. 1920 would be an arbitrary date where Palestinian nationalism was fixed as being fully against Zionism. The palestinian nationalist arose as a reaction to European invasion (mainly Zionists but not exclusively, German protestants also arrived in numbers, hence German colonies). Every form of nationalism (Zionism included, is a reaction to a perceived or actual external threat)....
 * Unfortunately the 2 articles are not covering the same subject, Palestinian nationalism was somehow missing from the original. The original was Israel centric and missing half the story and the Israel side was missing huge pertinent areas. Christian Zionism for a start...
 * Bringing things up on talk pages with Israel Project involvement is in most cases a waste of time...Take Lebanon's involvement in 1948...Historian say Lebanon didn't invade, the evidence was placed, 3 editor say those particular Historians were good sources, Israeli Project say but JVL and BBC are better sources and Lebanon invaded, so does the Israel Palestine conflict article reflect Historical records and current Historians research...No it reflects a tired old hackneyed Israeli mantra found in JVL....Sorry to say this but project Israel is stuck in a time warp that has been shown to be factually incorrect....Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 09:06, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Then bring up the matter with WikiProject Palestine. As it stands, you are openly admitting a POV fork at that is totally against WP's rules, whatever problems you have with old article Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 18:51, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Military-related deletion discussions.  —Nick-D (talk) 08:22, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I think 1920 is chosen because Palestinian nationalism shifted from a pan-Arab natinalism where Palestine would have been part of King Fayçal's kingdom to a purely Palestinian nationalism concerning the zone at the west of the Jordan river.
 * I confirm that no current historian deny that Lebanese army didn't enter Israeli territory or even Palestine... Ceedjee (talk) 09:20, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Delete Textbook case of a POV fork. Jtrainor (talk) 11:15, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep but remove POV - it is an encyclopedic concept. Bearian (talk) 14:19, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Strong Delete There is absolutely no logic to having this article, because: a) A logical split from History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict should be much smaller and with much less mutual information; b) A logical split from History of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict should be made in logical time periods, not X BCE–1967. Not to mention, the article itself as it is written is a POVFORK. Or, what, evey time an editor dislikes the consensus on some contested part of a national terrain we have new articles explaining how history really was from the Palestinian nationalist - or Ruritanian nationalist - point of view?  Not wise.Historicist (talk) 17:15, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete as POV fork, per nomination, which accurately describes the editing chronology leading to this fork. Canadian Monkey (talk) 23:37, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Consensus is not "let's use the JVL version" of history, the JVL version has been proved to be false since 1987...Yet the factually inaccurate JVL web version is still hanging around 20 years later...what do you want for wiki...a regurgitation of factually inaccurate web histories or something based on good verifiable secondary sources (with a few primary sources slipped in)?...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 10:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete - obvious POV fork. -- ChrisO (talk) 23:58, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Funny how one editor is trying to edit out pertinent areas from History of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Hist of I-P conflict does not cover all the areas and needs splitting; if Project Israel are unable or unwilling to do so, then Project Palestine will...Both History of and Israel-Palestinian conflict have areas that are factually incorrect...This is not a POV fork...I just haven't based it on JVL...as JVL is POV this article is neutral...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 18:25, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep and Rename to Origins of the Palestine problem. History of Israeli-Palestinian conflict is poorly named to deal with the history of the conflict prior to the establishment of Israel in 1948. Further, it cannot cover in sufficient detail all of this history in one article. There are major gaps in the article we currently have which can be covered in a new one. Speculating as to the motivations of the editor in creating the article and discounting its usefulness on that basis seems un-Wiki. Ashley kennedy 3 has put a lot of effort and thought into the article and there is a need for an article covering this earlier period. We can build on and improve on his effort, rather than just throwing it away, citing POV content. Fix it, don't throw it out.  T i a m u t talk 21:36, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Suggestion: Since the argument in favour of this article seems to be covering the "early" period in more detail (and, reading between the lines, I am highly suspicious of the true motives, but let's take this at face value), but the timescale of origin-1967 seems a bit arbitrary, how about two articles, one covering the history prior to the British Mandate, and one covering the British Mandate period? This, I think, would fit more logically with the existing articles rather than come across as an alternative account up to 1967, and I can't see the editors of the History of Israeli-Palestinian conflict having any objection to that. Just bear in mind that if the real purpose of these branch articles was to add as many pro-Palestinian references as you can manage, there are no grounds to complain if someone adds a load of pro-Israel references later. Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 22:45, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * An article on the British Mandate of Palestine already exists. I wouldn't object to a similar article on the Ottoman period, but I get the feeling that the Ottoman period isn't what is driving this AfD.  --GHcool (talk) 22:52, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * The 1967 was completely arbitrary...I had and have every intention of it being about European involvement in Palestine...a 150 year period (give or take a decade or 2)....the British mandate article is only about Britain sitting in the middle of two competing nationalist ideologies. This new article is about how Britain got to that point and how it handled it, the new article is not Ottoman period but about European intervention in Palestine and the competition of 4 Empires; French, British, Russian and Ottoman....Palestine was a side show to the various empires and only a means to dominate other aspects for the French dominate the Mediterranean, British trade with India (her Jewel in the crown), For Russia a manoeuvre for expansion into the Crimea and Balkans, for Ottomans protection of its crumbling empire...those aspects are not covered in any other article...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 03:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * As to the disingenuous argument of any POV some editors have intimated is in the article; may I remind them that wiki is not a one man edition but may be edited by all and everyone. If any editor is under the impression that an area or topic has not been included (not that the article is finished anyway) may I humbly suggest that they get their finger out and included it.....Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 04:20, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * In that case, I suggest the best way forwards is to create an article on the history of the conflict prior to the British Mandate (no objection to referring to that as just Palestine because that's what it was called at the time), and any additional material you want between 1920 and 1967 can go into the articles about those periods that already exist. The article as it stands, however, is too much like a fork of an existing article, and, POV fork or non-POV fork, that, at the best, will confuse the hell out of users. In the meantime, I'm slightly tweaking my vote to Delete and Userfy. The article as it stands isn't suitable for inclusion against the article that already exist, but I'm satisfied now there is a way forwards to change it into something that is. Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 09:41, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Israel-related deletion discussions.  --  Fabrictramp  |  talk to me  17:07, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Palestine-related deletion discussions.  --  Fabrictramp  |  talk to me  17:07, 28 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete - Undeniably sourced information that could appear elsewhere like Israel-Palestinian conflict and Palestinian people but here it is a POV fork, essay, poorly-written, cut & paste. --Shuki (talk) 21:13, 28 March 2009 (UTC)


 * the conflict did not start in any one era nor in any one's empire backyard. It passed through Napoleonic, British, Ottoman, Russian played its part with pogroms and balkans. Ottoman administration came went passed to mamluk and purely Egyptian all the while British were interfering around the region.
 * The Mandate period is not covered in any detail as it is swamped by later events and the factual accuracy of the British mandate article is questionable due to the inclusion of unreliable POV web site style history....I'm using RS books not extremist web links...If you want a web site style history may I humbly suggest you go to JVL et al and read their unreliable POV version as it seems that reliable historians using primary sources have a different version of reality to JVL et al....Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 21:29, 28 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete - classic POV fork. DVD 00:09, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I know the Idea of there being a Palestinian people is not a popular one, but the fact is there is a Palestinian people. The Idea for the articles is supported by Kimmerling, Baruch and Migdal, Joel S, (2003) The Palestinian People: A History, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, ISBN 0674011317  The Palestinian identity had a beginning. It is the equivalent of the plethora of wiki articles on every aspect of Zionism, this article is just one of the aspects of a Palestinian identity..."Palestinians struggled to create themselves as a people from the first revolt of the Arabs in Palestine in 1834 through the British Mandate to the impact of Zionism and the founding of Israel. Their relationship with the Jewish people and the State of Israel has been fundamental in shaping that identity, and today Palestinians find themselves again at a critical juncture." Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 09:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Err ... no-one who has posted to this AfD has disputed that. Every delete vote I have seen so far has been based on article forking, violation of neutral point of view, or both. If people think it is a POV fork, they are correct to vote for delete irrespective of whether they agree with it. (And, I have to say, comment like the one you've just made does make it sound like you are trying to push a certain POV on Wikipedia.) Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 10:00, 29 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep There is a tag on the original article History_of_the_Israeli-Palestinian_conflict that states the article is too long. Regardless of the editing being done at this time on the derived article(which very few have disputed or called indecent), the split was/is necessary.  Is this obvious enough? Cryptonio (talk) 00:36, 30 March 2009 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.